


Valentine's Day

by Anonymous



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, Valentine's Day, Valentine's Day Fluff, kind of a pwp
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-14
Updated: 2014-02-14
Packaged: 2018-01-12 08:26:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1184072
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky leaves Steve at the bar to go fiddle around with the jukebox in the corner, and even that looks authentic, like it really is 70 years from the past, and suddenly all of it is too much. Bucky’s hung his jacket on the back of a stool, and when he turns around and Steve’s able to look at him, really look at him for the first time in a long time, he gets a little misty-eyed. Because by God, Bucky really hasn’t changed much from what he looked like in the 40’s. A little older, some more lines on his face maybe, but the smile is still the same, turned up at the corners, with a twinkle in his eye.</p><p>The one where Bucky plans out Valentine's Day for Steve.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Valentine's Day

Valentine’s Day

 

            What kind of monster attacks on Valentine’s Day?

 

            _Crime stops for nothing,_ Steve thinks grimly as he sinks his shield into the guts of another doombot. The thing whirs, snapping at Steve’s face with its serrated claws before Steve slices those off too with the edge of the shield. At least today isn’t as messy as it could have been; just another robot attack, instead of having to deal with aliens, or other grotesque monsters and villains.

 

            _It could always be worse._

Steve’s not sure if that’s a very good motto for Captain America to have, but to be frank, Captain America is sick of being Captain America, especially on days like Valentine’s Day.

 

            Still, it’s worth it if he can save lives. There aren’t any casualties this time around, which Steve is more than grateful for. Couples in the street come up to hug him, thanking him, and saying this will surely be a Valentine’s Day to remember. For Steve, it’s just another day in costume, fighting people who want to see the world burn.

 

            “Fuck this noise,” Tony complains loudly through the comms, and it grates on Steve’s nerves. Nobody wants to be doing cleanup, but it’s a necessary evil. Tony’s in charge of making sure all the tech from the robots gets cleaned up and delivered to SHIELD so the wrong people don’t get their hands on it, and Steve’s in charge of ground level clean up.  Frankly, he thinks he has it worse.

 

            By the time he makes it back to his apartment, he’s exhausted and grimy and sweaty, the worst combination possible. Except maybe being bloody too. Yeah, Steve has a few scrapes from the battle, but not serious enough to warrant any medical attention. Steve stubbornly waved it off when SHIELD medical personnel tried to bring him in for a check-up. He’s lived through worse than a few lacerations and cracked bones.

 

            He doesn’t even think, just starts stripping down the second he closes the apartment door behind him, mindlessly setting the shield down on the floor and tossing his uniform haphazardly on the couch.

 

            “Oof!”

 

            Steve jumps, a huge surge of adrenaline shooting through him until he looks at the couch and sees it’s Bucky, feet kicked up with a book in his hands.

 

            “What are you doing here? Didn’t Fury send you on a mission?” Steve asks, bewildered. Unless he’s hallucinating Bucky on the couch, and he hasn’t hallucinated since that one time he got a fever and was sick for a month in 1935.

 

            Bucky grins a dopey smile up at him. “Sure did. I finished it early.”

 

            “Bucky, there’s no way you could have finished early. The target isn’t even supposed to get there until-“ Steve glances at the clock above the mantle, “four hours from now, in Kolkata.”

 

            Bucky pouts. “’Ya doubting my spying skills now? Jesus, Steve, throw a guy a bone once in a while.”

 

            Steve sighs, but can’t help a small smile when Bucky sits up and opens his arms, welcoming Steve. They stay wrapped up in each other for a few minutes before Steve pulls away in discomfort, still feeling gritty from the fight earlier today.

 

            “Coulda used you in the fight today, soldier,” Steve says sarcastically, but in his strictest “I am Captain America, and our country needs you” voice, which makes Bucky laugh.

 

            “You ain’t the boss of me anymore. Some bald-headed guy with an eye-patch is.”

 

            “Don’t be a jerk,” Steve laughs, pulling the rest of his uniform off. Under the suit, he’s got a nylon-kevlar jumpsuit, reinforced in areas covering his heart, kidneys, and stomach. He reaches for the zip at the side but Bucky gets to it first, curling himself over Steve’s back as he slowly unzips the uniform.

 

            “Bucky, I-“

 

            “Shhh…” he mutters, kissing Steve behind the ear. “We’re not going to. Not when you look like you’re about to faint in the middle of the floor.”

 

            Bucky leads him by the hand into the shower, where he urges Steve to sit on the bench, adjusting the spray and temperature. It’s extra hot, just like Steve likes it, and the spray feels perfect on his sore muscles. Bucky strips too and joins him underneath the water, soaping up his sooty hair and easing the tension out of his shoulders, peppering his skin with kisses each time after he finishes cleaning it. Steve’s too tired to do anything but sit there and give himself over to Bucky’s capable hands.

 

            Bucky washes out the soap and starts the process over again, humming as he presses his thumbs into knots on Steve’s back. The tune sounds familiar, but Steve’s too tired to think of what it could be, just lets the sound of Bucky’s voice lull him.

 

            The water is starting to turn cool when Bucky finally shuts off the tap and retrieves a towel, wrapping Steve first, then himself, moving them both out of the shower and into the bedroom.

 

            Steve sinks onto the mattress without a second thought and falls asleep.

 

            ---

 

            When Steve wakes up, still a little groggy, Bucky is sitting next to him, leaning against the headboard reading again. Steve looks at the clock and guesses he’s been asleep for about five hours. It’s around 9pm. He’s already feeling better, the serum quick to fix most of the major injuries. There are still a couple of cuts and scrapes that pull when he moves, but he’s not as sore as he was a few hours ago.

 

            “Hey.” He says, voice rough with sleep.

 

            “Hi, Sleeping Beauty,” Bucky says, leaning over to give him a kiss. Steve scowls playfully.

 

            “What?”

 

            “We never got to see that one, came out twenty years after the war. I’ve been doing some catching up,” Bucky says, returning to his book. Steve’s sees now that it’s an anthology of the Grimm’s Fairy tales.

 

            “What happened to her in the Grimm’s?”

 

            Bucky winces. “You probably don’t wanna know.”

 

            Steve agrees, shifting a little so he can snuggle closer to Bucky. And that’s when he notices the rose petals.

 

            Everywhere, littered across the entire bed, dark red bright against the navy blue sheets, on the floor as well. Steve can’t believe he didn’t notice them when he was falling asleep.

 

            “Bucky, did you put _rose petals_ on our bed?”

 

            “Yeah, so?” Bucky says, glowing red and adamantly refusing to meet Steve’s gaze. “I thought it would be nice, Valentine’s Day and all.”

 

            Steve rolls his eyes. “And they call ME the sap,” he murmurs, gently plucking the volume out of Bucky’s hands and leaning in to kiss him.

 

            “Wait, wait, wait, we can’t do this yet, this comes later,” Bucky gasps against Steve’s mouth.

 

            “We can come now _and_ later,” Steve says with a wink, and Bucky laughs but shakes his head. “Patience is a virtue Steve, didn’t anyone ever tell you that? C’mon, I promise it’ll be worth the wait.”

 

            Steve admires Bucky’s boxer-clad ass as he moves around the room, throwing on a pair of jeans and a light colored t-shirt, tossing Steve a pair of jeans off the floor and a shirt from his dresser.

 

            “Where are we going?”

 

            “It’d ruin the surprise if I told you,” Bucky says, throwing on a leather jacket.

 

\---

 

            They end up at a dive bar, which doesn’t seem particularly romantic, looking at it from the outside. It looks like it could be any other small, neighborhood bar in Brooklyn, brick walls, a bouncer standing at the door. Bucky flashes him a pass and the guy lets both of them in without another word.

 

            Steve can’t help but be disappointed that Bucky’s idea of a great Valentine’s evening is going to a bar, but that is until he sees what the inside looks like.

 

            It’s been decorated to look like the inside of a World War II era bar, and it’s completely empty, save for the bartender, who slides two drinks over to them without either of them saying anything, and then leaving through a back door, so him and Bucky are completely alone.

 

            Bucky takes a sip out of his, offering some to Steve. He’s pleasantly surprised by the rich, heady taste of it; it doesn’t taste like gasoline, which is what Steve thinks most other alcoholic drinks taste like.

 

            Bucky leaves Steve at the bar to go fiddle around with the jukebox in the corner, and even that looks authentic, like it really is 70 years from the past, and suddenly all of it is too much. Bucky’s hung his jacket on the back of a stool, and when he turns around and Steve’s able to look at him, really look at him for the first time in a long time, he gets a little misty-eyed. Because by god, Bucky really hasn’t changed much from what he looked like in the 40’s. A little older, some more lines on his face from stress, but the smile is still the same, turned up at the corners, with a twinkle in his eye.

 

            Bucky frowns when he catches Steve’s expression.

 

            “Is something wrong?”

 

            “Nah,” Steve says, clearing his throat so he doesn’t sound too choked up. “Just…a lot of memories, is all.”

 

            The jukebox starts playing the same tune Bucky was humming earlier in the shower today, and Steve recognizes it.

 

            Bucky holds out a hand. “A dance?”

 

            They stand in the middle of the deserted 1940’s era bar, arms wrapped around each other, swaying to the music.

 

            “We’ll meet again…” Bucky murmurs.

 

            “Don’t know where, don’t know when…” Steve continues. He knows this song. He remembers hearing it, playing out of the radio on the windowsill of the apartment next door before he went to war.

 

            “But I know we’ll meet again, some sunny day.”

 

            They hold each other close when the song ends, bodies pressed together close, chest to chest. Bucky presses his forehead against Steve’s and they kiss, slowly, because now, now they have all the time in the world.

 

\---

 

            The city is bustling when they finally leave the dive bar, streets crowded with couples holding hands, walking around the city at night on Valentine’s Day. Steve thinks Bucky’s going to want to do the same, and is surprised yet again when Bucky instead hails a taxi and directs the driver to a different part of town.

 

            Steve recognizes the name as the place where they grew up, a small area right on the outskirts of Brooklyn during World War II that got even smaller as the years went on. Few people still live there, mostly old folks who never moved out.

 

            Bucky’s hand is warm in his, sending pleasant tingles up and down Steve’s spine. They can do this now. It still feels so strange, that even though Steve’s been out of the ice for a while, it hasn’t been that long for him since doing something as simple as holding Bucky’s hand would have gotten them both in danger.

 

            Bucky takes them to the theatre.

 

            Not just any theatre, but _the_ theatre, the theatre that only charged a quarter for a movie on the weekends, a nickel on the weekdays. The one where Steve first saw news reels of the war. The one where Bucky would sometimes lean in, real close, to whisper in Steve’s ear about how silly an actress looked, and it wouldn’t be strange at all because they were in a theatre, and you had to whisper out of courtesy.

 

            Steve had always loved the dark of the theatre as an excuse for Bucky to be close to him.

 

            They sit in the middle row (the first time Steve’s sat in the middle of a theatre, ever) and Bucky makes some sort of signal to the projection box, and the projectionist inside moves to load the cartridge.

 

            They’re a series of short 1940’s cartoons, the quality as choppy and flickering as Steve remembers it.

 

            Bucky leans across the barrier separating their seats, but instead of whispering something in Steve’s ear, he nibbles at the lobe gently, kissing him on the jaw before turning back to the movie. Steve turns to him and turns his face, kissing him thoroughly. Bucky’s in his lap in the next second.

 

            Steve doesn’t remember much else about the movie.

 

            ---

 

            It’s close to midnight by the time they get back to the apartment room, and Steve is beyond sexually frustrated, because even alone in the theatre, nothing more than kisses and a few suggestive touches happened, and Steve’s never known Bucky to be such a tease.

 

            “One last thing,” Bucky promises, shooting Steve a cheeky smile. The damned boy knows how much he’s affecting Steve, if his mischievous grin is anything to go by.

 

            Bucky makes dinner for the two of them, setting it down on the small wooden table in their apartment with a nice bottle of port.

 

            The dinner is simple, stuffed chicken, with sautéed mushrooms on the side, and a small salad.

 

            It’s so modest, yet Steve doesn’t think he’s been happier in his life when Bucky shuts off the lights in the apartment and lights candles that have been set out on the table for, Steve suspects, he bought especially for this night.

 

            Bucky scoops some food off his own plate and feeds a bit of it to Steve, and the gesture is so sweet it makes Steve’s heart hurt, in the best way possible.

 

            He loves Bucky so, so much.

 

            Afterwards, they share a cup of port, snuggled together on the couch.

 

            “Sorry about being so grumpy earlier today,” Steve murmurs, sipping out of the cup. The wine is even sweeter when he licks it off Bucky’s lips.

 

            Bucky smiles. “Don’t worry about it. Captain America may not be allowed to get grumpy, but Steve Rogers can be grumpy whenever he wants to be.”

 

            They cuddle and kiss for a while longer, for once, no obligations, no people to save, no places to be.

 

            “Got anything else planned for the night?” Steve asks innocently. Bucky gives him a look that all too clearly says he isn’t fooled.

 

            “Wellllll, there was that one thing that we didn’t get to earlier today,” Bucky says with a devilish grin. “I _did_ promise that more would be _coming_ later?...”

 

            Steve is too excited to even roll his eyes at Bucky’s stolen pun, instead standing up and sweeping Bucky off his feet and into his arms, which earns him an indignant glare that’s more heat from passion than anything.

 

            Sometimes when they have sex, it’s quick and dirty, up against the shower wall, hard in bed, and on one notable occasion, in an empty SHIELD office, when Bucky was being deployed on short notice for an extremely risky emergency black ops mission.

 

            Today is one of those rare days when there is nothing pushing them to fuck dirty and fast, and Steve loves it when these chances come up, savors the time.

 

            Bucky lays him flat on the bed and dims the lights, opening the curtains so that the room is illuminated in the glow of the moon. He crawls towards Steve on the bed and they move against each other, slow, in the darkness.

 

            They make love, Bucky taking him apart gently with just his hands and mouth, treating him as if he were something precious and breakable.

 

            When Bucky finally sinks in to him it’s nothing short of pure bliss, and they move seamlessly, together.

 

            Bucky’s everywhere at once, tongue dancing small circles around Steve’s nipples, hands rubbing up and down the length of his back, pressing them closer, until Steve doesn’t know where Bucky ends and he begins.

 

            They come at almost the same time, Steve following a few seconds after Bucky, who strokes Steve reverently through his orgasm. Afterwards, they lay tangled and sweaty, faces so close enough that their lips touch, breathing in evenly shared breaths.

 

            “Happy Valentine’s Day,” Bucky murmurs. Steve can feel a smile against his lips.  

**Author's Note:**

> I stayed up till 3:30am on the night before Valentine's Day writing this, ugh. Silly boys. Also, the song from the jukebox is a Vera Lynn song called We'll Meet Again.


End file.
